Randy Foster: A troubling week for New Bern

I knew Monday that I’d be writing my column this week about Lee Bettis, but unlike others I’ve written (and cartoon strips I’ve created ) in an occasional series called “Another World,” there is nothing this week that can rightly be made fun of.

I knew Monday that I’d be writing my column this week about Lee Bettis, but unlike others I’ve written (and cartoon strips I’ve created ) in an occasional series called “Another World,” there is nothing this week that can rightly be made fun of.

As far as I know, I’m the first journalist to contact Mayor Bettis on Monday after he was charged with DWI and two other traffic violations by Havelock police. He had been observed driving erratically on N.C. 101 on his way from his temporary home in Beaufort to drop his step-children off at school in New Bern.

Sun Journal reporters had tried to contact him Monday morning, and TV reports only showed him avoiding their cameras.

But when I dialed his office phone number, Bettis answered the phone himself.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I said.

He did.

Bettis and I have an odd sort of relationship. I’ve poked fun at him, written editorials criticizing him, shared laughs with him and have given him credit when I believed credit was due. My wife and his wife have had coffee together.

For awhile, there was a vague invitation to have a backyard grilled dinner at his house that never materialized.

I believe that when Lee Bettis talks with me, he does not see me as an enemy. Lawyers are good at partitioning their lives that way.

On the phone Monday morning, when Bettis told me he was not under the influence of an intoxicant, that he failed a sobriety test because recent hip surgery made it hard for him to keep his balance, and that his poor driving was simply due to exhaustion, I believed him.

Our conversation was interrupted when his wife Nicole contacted him on another line. When he got back to me, he said, simply, “Nicole is furious.”

I’ve been there. For the moment, it was not a conversation between a journalist and a politician, it was a conversation between two men on their second marriages with step kids and jobs to juggle.

Only I was taking notes, and information from those notes appeared in a news story.

Tuesday went by routinely. The Sun Journal staff was working on a followup to the Bettis story. I was trying to decide if I should write an “Another World” column or something more serious.

Then, on Wednesday morning, we learned that the Bettises had been fighting early that morning, and that according to Nicole (on the 911 call), the fight became physical. Per Mrs. Bettis (on the 911 call), it wasn’t the first time.

There’s nothing funny about domestic violence.

We learned that Mayor Bettis had either driven from Beaufort to New Bern in the middle of the night to sleep in his office, or, as he told a TV station, he had not been to Beaufort at all that night.

Page 2 of 2 - Mrs. Bettis texted a TV station that her husband is a good man. Her father did his best to chase off TV reporters outside the Bettis home in Beaufort.

And throughout the day, Mayor Bettis could not be reached.

I truly worried for the Bettis family.

By Thursday morning, the extended Bettis family was full of regrets and embarrassment. In a news conference, Bettis’ father-in-law expressed affection for his son-in-law, said he had not harmed his daughter, and asked for privacy. Bettis’ office manager said the mayor was taking a two-month leave of absence to tend to family.

It’s a wise step. I wish Lee and Nicole and their children and in-laws well and pray that they come out the other side stronger and wiser.

But because he is dealing with all this, Bettis should resign — for the good of his family, and for the good of the city.

Thanks for letting me take up some of your Sunday morning.

Randy Foster is managing editor of the Sun Journal. Email him or call him at 252-635-5663. Follow him on Twitter @rivereditor.